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Overdrive February 2019

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February 2019 |
Overdrive
| 15
The state of New York has not been
issuing citations to carriers and driv-
ers for failure to use an electronic
logging device, the state's Supreme
Court confirmed in a decision issued
in late December.
Furthermore, citations for non-
compliance with the ELD mandate,
which took effect in December
2017, will not be issued until the
state adopts the U.S. Department of
Transportation's ELD rule into its
own regulations, the court said.
However, inspectors still may
request to see an ELD to verify hours
of service compliance, though they
cannot download or transmit any
data from the device.
Also, the Federal Motor Carrier
Safety Administration still can
hold carriers and drivers account-
able for lack of compliance with the
ELD mandate during compliance
reviews and safety audits, said Collin
Mooney, director of the Commercial
Vehicle Safety Alliance.
According to the opinion filed
Dec. 31 by Judge Richard M. Platkin
of the state's Supreme Court, state
enforcers have not been issuing
citations and thereby haven't been
enforcing the mandate. The deci-
sion came as part of an ongoing
lawsuit filed by the Owner-Operator
Independent Drivers Association,
which claimed the state was enforc-
ing the mandate despite not having
adopted the federal ELD rule into
state code.
The court disagreed with OOIDA's
assertion that the state was enforcing
the mandate, instead confirming that
it hadn't — and wouldn't, pending
the state's adoption of the ELD rule.
The NYDOT official interviewed
by Overdrive said he couldn't com-
ment as to when the state would
codify the ELD mandate but that
industry stakeholders should "keep
watching" for it.
FMCSA requires that states adopt
federal safety rules for the purposes
of uniformity and for state enforce-
ment personnel to enforce the regu-
lations.
OOIDA's challenge to New York's
ELD enforcement is part of a broader
initiative by the group to push back
on enforcement in states that haven't
formally adopted the ELD mandate.
However, many states have rebuked
OOIDA's stance, arguing they have
the authority to enforce the rule
despite the lack of specific adoption.
— James Jaillet
Robot package delivery
At last month's 2019 Consumer Electronics Show in
Las Vegas, Continental showed off a driverless home
package delivery van concept. In addition to the
autonomous vehicle, the Continental Urban Mobility
Experience (CUbE) deploys four-legged robots
to navigate around obstacles, walk up to porch steps
and ring doorbells. The CUbE also can double as a
robo-taxi to move people around urban centers.
New York postpones ELD citations
Unified Carrier Registration fees for
trucking companies, brokers and
freight forwarders for 2019 were
reduced from 2018 levels so as not to
exceed the statutory maximum set by
Congress. Fees will climb in 2020 but
remain below 2010-18 levels.
The new fees went into effect Dec.
28. Registration for 2019 is available
at UCR.gov and must be completed by
April 1. For carriers with one or two
trucks, the 2019 fee is $62. In 2020,
that fee will climb to $68.
For 2019, carriers with three to
five trucks pay $185, those with six
to 20 trucks pay $368, those with 21
to 100 trucks pay $1,283, and fleets
with 101 to 1,000 trucks pay $6,112.
Carriers with more than 1,000
trucks pay $59,689 this year and
$66,072 next year.
Under the UCR Plan and
Agreement, the maximum amount
of annual revenues that can be col-
lected from carriers is $107.78 mil-
lion. Fees collected in 2017 exceeded
that maximum by $7.3 million, so
the fee reductions for 2019 and 2020
are to ensure registration fees don't
exceed the maximum within the
next two years.
— Matt Cole
UCR fees dip again in 2019